Mr. Foxman entered a sound-proof booth in the little corridor that opened off the main-entry hall of the club and, after calling up the night desk and notifying Sloan he would not come to the office at all that night, asked Sloan to send Hemburg to the telephone. "Is that you, Hemburg?" he was saying, half a minute later. "Listen, Hemburg, this is very important: You remember that story I turned over to you last night? ... Yes, that's the same one--the story I told you we would run, provided I could establish one main point. Well, I couldn't establish that point--we can't prove up on our principal allegation. That makes it dangerous to have the thing even standing in type. So you go upstairs and kill it--kill it yourself with your own hands, I mean. I don't want to take any chances on a slip-up. Dump the type and have it melted up. And, Hemburg--say nothing to anyone about either the story itself or what has happened to it. Understand me? ... Good. And, Hemburg, here's another thing: You recall the other story that I told you was being held for release--the one on the Mexican situation? It's got a Washington date line over it. Well, shove it in to-night as your leading news feature. If we hold it much longer it's liable to get stale--the way things are breaking down there in Mexico. All right; good-bye!" He had rung off and hung up and was coming out of the little booth when a fresh inspiration came to him and he stepped back in again. One factor remained to be eliminated--Singlebury. Until that moment Mr. Foxman had meant to sacrifice Singlebury by the simple expedient of sending him next day on an out-of-town assignment--over into New Jersey, or up into New England perhaps--and then firing him by wire, out of hand, for some alleged reportorial crime, either of omission or of commission. It would be easy enough to cook up the pretext, and from his chief's summary dismissal of him Singlebury would have no appeal. But suppose Singlebury came back to town, as almost surely he would, and suppose he came filled with a natural indignation at having been discharged in such fashion, and suppose, about the same time, he fell to wondering why his great story on the Pearl Street trolley steal had not been printed--certainly Singlebury had sense enough to put two and two together--and suppose on top of that he went gabbling his suspicions about among the born gossips of Park Row? It might be awkward.